Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The Copley painting, London pictures and Victorian galleries
The layout of the entire gallery is designed around the gigantic and very dramatic
painting
he
Defeat of the Floating Batteries at Gibraltar, September 1782
by
John
Singleton Copley
, depicting the Brits magnanimously saving the drowning enemy
from flaming barques. Commissioned by the Corporation, poor old Copley had to
redo the entire thing when the garrison o
cers insisted on having more prominence.
One of the gallery's strengths is its wide range of
London
pictures - depicting City
ceremonies, bygone vistas of old London, postwar bomb sites and so on - which
you'll find sprinkled throughout the collection. On the ground floor, you'll also find
a small sample of works by the English artist
Matthew Smith
(1879-1959), who was
heavily influenced by Cézanne's late works and Matisse's Fauvist phase. Confusingly,
it's in the
Victorian galleries
that you'll find one of the 22 portraits, commissioned
GUILDHALL TO
CANNON STREET
Clockmakers'
Museum
Guildhall
0
100
Guildhall
Art Gallery
yards
CAFÉ
Café Below
1
St Margaret
Lothbury
St Lawrence
Jewry
Bank of England
Museum
HSBC
St Mary-
le-Bow
Royal
Exchange
Bank
No. 1
Poultry
Mansion
House
St Mary
Woolnoth
Temple of Mithras
(ruins)
St Mary
Aldermary
N
St Stephen
Walbrook
Mansion
House
St Mary
Abchurch
London
Stone
Cannon
Street
Tallow
Chandlers
St James
Garlickhythe
Cannon
Street
Station
Skinners
Hall
St Michael
Paternoster
Royal
Monument
